The artist’s performance videos invoke the wild, inestimable human spirit and make Black people the characters of universal stories.
STOWE, Vt. — Across three adjacent screens, a warrior slathered in black oil and clothed only in dark briefs draws her double-edged sword, carefully, ceremoniously, across another combatant’s. The opponent falls back, both sword arm and sword outstretched to keep her at bay. The warrior grips her blade with her naked left hand, applies force. Her opponent sinks to her knees still holding her own sword like a talisman, like a shield, like a plea for détente. The aggressor pulls back as murky crimson water swims up and around both warriors’ legs. Around them swirl six other performers, all armed with swords and clothed similarly, with their skin wholly coated in a dark lubricant so that only their palms, the insides of their ears, or their gleaming teeth break the obsidian spell. Even the typically white sclera of their eyes look dark (an effect I find out later is produced by wearing contact lenses) so they seem like members of an alien race performing a ritual of yet unknown significance.
I am watching “TЯUTH,” a three-channel video installation by Miles Greenberg at his solo show at the Current in Stowe, Vermont. The video is a lyrical, 15-minute distillation of a seven-hour durational performance staged in 2023 at Powerhouse Arts in Brooklyn, New York. Though the performers, who are all Black, make dramatic cuts and parries, as a former fencer I can tell they have carefully rehearsed, not intending to hurt each other. Greenberg confirmed this, conveying to me via the Current’s curator and executive director, Rachel Moore, that the swords are steel but the edges dulled. Regardless, the scenes are visually arresting. Throughout the video most of the engagements shown involve two fighters, but one scenario involves several fighters attempting to subdue a single warrior, which raises the stakes of danger, though I am relatively sure no one will be harmed.
One of the most entrancing moments arrives when Greenberg, who is one of the performers, draws the flat of his sword against his tongue, thus transferring the black pigment to his mouth as he smiles conspiratorially at the camera. I am reminded of Friedrich Nietzsche’s contention in his On the Genealogy of Morality that the human animal was originally incalculable and wild, not acting in predictable, normalized ways. He argues that our development of custom, law, and punishment has caused us to become calculable despite our chaotic animal nature. In an adjoining gallery, another video work even more powerfully invokes that sense of our wild, inestimable spirit.
“LE MIROIR,” a six-channel video presentation displayed on six monitors installed in a circle, is the second and final work in this show. It consists of an edited recording of a 2025 performance at Marrakesh's historic El Badi Palace for the 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair, combined with footage shot in the Emirati desert on the border with Oman. There are 10 performers, again covered in black pigment and clothed in black athletic wear at various points in the video, standing atop plinths with mirrored surfaces and seated within a serene pool of water. The plinths are the mirrors, reflecting the surrounding landscape as the performers strike stylized and statuesque poses. Their sclera and irises here appear all white, again making them seem like users of magic, and they are attended by local animals that might represent their familiars: piebald pythons and white storks. At one point, a lone man sits atop a mirrored disc in a modified lotus position while a python swirls around his bare neck, chest, and shoulders. A significant part of the work follows Greenberg and another man engaging in physical play: walking while holding hands, tumbling down a desert dune together, carrying each other on their backs. The Current describes the work as “a surreal queer love story inspired by the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice,” which seems plausible but may be a bit too precise for what Greenberg ultimately offers.